International garments sector reacts to Forum article

"The Association of Apparel and Textile Exporters in Bulgaria is
organizing a trade show for professionals. Having read your
article, can you visit Sofia and present your views and ITC
information to the participants? Could we distribute your article
and other relevant ITC materials to our Bulgarian member
companies?"

"I'm a director of a marketing company in India. Your message is a
warning as well as an encouragement to exporting companies, to keep
market share or increase their business through attention to
quality, pricing and other competitiveness issues."

"I work in the New York office of the Korean Government's Agency
for Trade and Investment (KOTRA). Your article was comprehensive
and forward-looking. You mentioned that ITC helps countries to
elaborate country action plans. What is a country action plan, and
how can others qualify to get this assistance from ITC?"

Yong Chang (yhchang@kotra.or.kr), Korean
Agency for Trade and Investment,United States of America

"Your article was excellent and most timely, as a number of East
African countries, where I work, are investing heavily in the
textile and apparel sectors, but are uncertain of the future
viability of those investments. One aspect you might have spelled
out more clearly is the impact of investments undertaken to benefit
from [preferential access schemes such as] the United States'
African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) programme. What will be
the future of investments made by Kenya, for example, to ship
apparel to the United States market? Will these countries be able
to compete with other developing countries, especially those in
Asia, post-2004? Is there scope, within agreed trade measures, for
the United States to continue to offer duty-free access to its
markets for selected African countries?"

"Congratulations for the wonderful article. World trade in clothing
is currently around US$ 200 billion. What do you expect will happen
over 2006-2008, and do you think there is potential for countries
like China, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Indonesia to export clothing
to India after 2004? Do you think big international retail chain
stores will open outlets in India?"

"I read your article with interest, and noted that ITC has worked
out country action plans for some countries to deal with the
situation. Oman exports garments under quota to the United States,
and these garments form a major chunk of manufactured exports. Can
ITC work out an action plan for Oman?

LDCs benefit from exchange of experiences at Executive
Forum

"From two perspectives, I consider it tremendously worthwhile that
I could attend the recent Executive Forum in Cancún, Mexico.

First, the many new ideas from decision-makers from different
countries, at different levels of development, open up the mind to
prospects and problems.

The second perspective is subtly different. Developing countries
often suffer from the scourge of feeling helpless. The feeling that
we are far behind can mean we give up trying to improve. Whether on
a personal or a national level, the will to change fades because
there is not enough positive feedback. The Executive Forum,
however, highlights experiences from countries with different
levels of success and failure, in various sectors. Every country in
such a situation finds areas where they are more advanced and areas
where they can improve. Decision-makers can get encouragement by
seeing what others in similar situations have done, and what they
have realistically achieved - and thus identify practical areas for
putting in efforts.

Participating in the meeting was also especially useful to me
because it focused on the interests of SMEs, the business group I
represent on behalf of the Dhaka Chamber.

Thanks to all members of ITC whose serious commitment helped make
the meeting the success it was."

Editor's note

We encourage readers to make broad use of Trade
Forum articles, but we don't hear frequently
enough from you about how you are doing it. Please let us know by
sending an e-mail to domeisen@intracen.org